Realities
The State of Dating and Relationships in 2025: A Sneak Peek
Trends to Watch Out For in the New Year
Dating and relationships aren’t immune to change. Core principles stick around, but concepts go in and out. You may have picked up on this if you’ve been in the dating scene for a while. But if you’re still new to romance, here’s some news for you: change is consistent.
These changes come with trends that become part of people’s vocabulary. Some remain low-key, while others go viral and become hot topics on digital platforms.
By the time you read this, 2025 will either be a stone’s throw away or already in full swing. The new year brings a new batch of crazes and terms that you may come across. According to a recent survey, here are some you may want to watch out for:
Micro-mance
Before the age of swipes, romance used to mean grand gestures. Bouquets of roses, candlelit dinners, and bold declarations were the standard.
While these practices haven’t gone away (and they probably won’t), modern daters are looking for more subtlety. According to the survey, 86% of 40,000 singles now express their love differently. They lean more towards sharing playlists, sending memes, or taking walks while carrying their morning coffee.
Say hello to micro-mance, a trend emphasizing small gestures that leave large impacts. And with that, who says romance is dead?
Loud looking
If 2024 taught us anything about dating and relationships, shame is regretful and wasteful. Why deny yourself something you desire?
We shouldn’t feel sorry for going after what we like anymore. If you fancy somebody, shoot your shot! You have nothing to lose here.
Enter loud looking. This is about being upfront with your needs and wants. Ditch the guessing games and mixed signals and swap them with directness.
There’s no use in beating around the bush when you can go straight to the point. This trend will save many daters the time and trouble of walking on eggshells.
Date With Me (DWM)
No one need to know every little detail about someone’s dating life. Some things are best kept to themselves.
But for some singles, documentation gets them through their romantic endeavors. For others, they just want to, as kids say these days, keep it real. Whether it’s for themselves or an audience is another story.
DWM has daters expressing the raw and real sides of their love lives in real-time. They cover the bad and ugly moments along with the good. This practice has been around for a while, and there are no signs of it slowing down as another year ushers in.
Future-proofing
No one can predict how relationships and dating will go. They’re just among the things that are out of our control. We’re not mind-readers or physicists, after all.
This unpredictability is why 95% of singles are worried about their futures. And that anxiety is a major factor in choosing how and who they date.
And with that uncertainty, they’re looking for partners who’ll provide consistency, stability, and direction. The occasional spontaneity is fun, but more and more daters are shifting to deliberate actions. This decisiveness won’t go away soon.
Regardless of what you’re looking for, you may encounter these dating and relationship trends in 2025. You can either join in or opt out — it’s up to you.
Reference
Butler, Sinead. 2024. “What Is Male-Casting? Bumble Reveals Its 2025 Dating Trend Predictions.” Indy100. https://www.indy100.com/lifestyle/bumble-dating-trend-predictions-2025.
